by Glen Cook
There was power there, with that strange man, and with another of similar stamp who followed him into the light. Else saw no reason why anyone should run from them, though.
They must be the blond men who had caused the stir in Brothe. The men who had decimated the Brotherhood, who had subjected the Calziran pirates to such slaughter, who had turned up during his encounter with Starkden and Masant el-Seyhan. Principatй Doneto called them soultaken. They were living dead men serving the Instrumentalities of the Night. One of which had shielded him and suggested that he lie low.
Imperial troops raced out of the storm-water drain. Once in the light, though, they became indecisive. The Pramans had scattered. Pinkus Ghort and his cohorts had taken cover.
The two soultaken started toward the Brothen reserves. Then the one carrying the head and bronze sword halted.
Slowly, he turned. His gaze rose to Else Tage. Else felt the elation there. He felt the soultaken's thrill of recognition. The man hoisted head and sword aloft. He screamed at the sky in an unknown tongue.
A dense, dark mist gushed from the storm drain. It coalesced into something huge, ugly, foul, and dark, one moment not unlike a classic harpy, the next a monster mantis. Frightened Braunsknechts followed the example of the fleeing Pramans.
The thing wore a new shape but Else knew this was the demon from beneath Waterhouse Two.
She loomed over the soultaken. The one armed with head and sword was not impressed. He beckoned Else down.
Why?
To kill him. And thereby destroy the knowledge he carried.
What? That made no sense.
It does to him. It does to those who sent him. They do not understand that knowledge discovered cannot be undiscovered. Today they will learn.
Those words were not quite a voice in Else's head. They were knowledge that materialized there. He had been touched directly by the Night.
The harpy became mist again. That shrank, became a large blonde woman. She faced off with the soultaken. Both were confused and irresolute.
The Imperial soldiers knew what they were seeing. And did not want to believe that they were.
Else caught some of the buzz. Here was a legend come to life, a goddess risen from an abandoned faith. An Instrumentality no longer sustained by the world.
She squared off with the soultaken.
Else started to climb down the wall. Soldiers of various allegiances pointed and whispered. Had he made a wrong move?
Circle to your right and rejoin your raiders.
Else's amulet burned and froze his wrist. Uncle Divino's ring weighed a hundred pounds. He slunk like a rat making its getaway, darting from cover to cover.
The soultaken paid no attention. They had lost interest.
Pinkus Ghort and his raiders, though, kept track. Ghort and half a dozen Brothens came out to cover him.
"I appreciate this, Pinkus. But you should know better."
"Not that big a risk. They're totally infatuated over there." Ghort poked a finger. "Chooser of the Slain. The Banished One. Who would've thought it possible?"
"Who indeed?" Grateful for the mythological cue, Else mused, "Arlensul, you really think?"
Ghort shrugged. "It fits. But who wants to find out? How about you talk less and hustle more?" By then, though, they were tumbling in amongst the crusaders, who were captivated by the heathen confrontation. "You know the hairball with the extra head?"
"No. He might be the one they were after in Brothe, though. Why?"
"It looked like he was trying to call you out."
"It did, didn't it? What was that about? What happened to our prizes?"
"Lothar and them? The Principatйs sent them back to camp."
"That figures."
"Don't it?"
"We'll still be fighting the Unbeliever and they'll already be trying to blackmail Johannes."
"That's politics. What the hell are they doing now?"
Else and Ghort had just slithered into a position from which they could watch the supernatural confrontation.
Principatй Divino eased up beside Else, opposite Pinkus Ghort. He was a mess, wet and muddy. He was terrified. "The Instrumentality that controls those two souls is about to manifest. What happened in there, Hecht? We lost track of you."
Was the man suspicious? Not obviously. Else told the truth, leaving out little but his exchange with Bone and his encounter with the woman yonder.
The elderly Bruglioni said, "Oh my! I've let curiosity murder me."
"What?"
"I should've gone when I could. We all should have."
The soultaken with the head and sword expanded slowly, till it loomed over the woman. She had acquired a brazen shield and golden spear from somewhere. The soultaken opened his mouth and bellowed, 'Traitor!"
The woman responded, "Vengeance! All-Father. All-Evil. It is time to die the Endless Death."
"Oh, for sure, I should've gone," Principatй Divino moaned. "I was such a fool! It's real! It's all real."
Ghort said, "Looks like times might get interesting."
The soultaken spoke two words. While those rattled around they took physical form, as two flapping black towels of darkness that transformed into something like a brace of black vultures. Each screamed one of the words the soultaken had spoken. Their names?
Else felt that the female apparition was pleased.
The flapping black things settled toward the soultaken. Uncle Divino murmured, "It's been said that all religions are true. But how can this be?"
These events rattled the faith of everyone watching.
"For Gedanke," Arlensul said, in response to a question unheard.
The possessed soultaken bellowed again, flung himself at his prodigal daughter.
The fabric of reality creaked. It began to tear.
37. A Loving God, a Loving Father
Svavar's mind was clearer and his thoughts crisper than ever. He watched the Godslayer rappel down the wall, unseen by Shagot. Grim saw nothing but Arlensul. Grim did not understand that Arlensul had been with them from their arrival on that ancient battleground. He was not, in fact, Grimur Grimmsson now. He was the worldly avatar of the Gray Walker, come to finish dealing with a traitorous daughter.
The Godslayer had no place in his thoughts.
The Old Ones mirrored their creature Shagot: crude, thoughtless, violent, ignorant of pity or remorse. And none too smart. What use smart if you were omnipotent and immortal?
The black flapping things came together in the gap between Instrumentalities, chased one another in a whirling mandala of darkness that spun in multiple dimensions. The Instrumentalities screamed at one another, proclaiming senseless rage and hatred. While the mandala grew.
Svavar stared at the thing his brother had become, unable to accept it although he believed it. Arlensul's defiance had conjured the One Who Harkens … now armed with the hammer club for which his favorite son was famous. The mandala, shedding a ripping roar, revealed glimpses of horrors beyond. Glimpses of old corpses abiding an opportunity to rise up and serve deities who held them in trivial regard.
Arlensul lashed out with her spear, pleased with her father's response so far. The Walker slid aside. His hammer made a gong of Arlensul's shield.
Words formed deep in Svavar's mind. Do not forget your dearest wish. Do not forget who has been your most devoted protector.
Which mainly baffled Svavar.
What could he do besides watch the titans clash?
Father and daughter traded blow for blow. The countryside resounded to their fury. Despite their terror, mortals stopped running, watched enrapt.
Soon, my chosen one.
Svavar began to shake, colder than naked in Andoray's iciest winter, dreading the foulness to come.
Which evil most torments the world?
Within the mandala Arlensul's sisters were wakening the Heroes.
Not good, that. There was Erief…. What was left of murdered Erief after centuries in that terrible Hall.
The great god of me north flung his hammer aside. It never fell to the ground. A staff appeared in his hands, in myth carved of ash cut from the great World Tree, a living, sentient tree whose roots reached into every well of knowledge there was. The Walker slammed that staff's iron shod foot into Arlensul's shield. The shield split. Only the smaller fragment remained in the Chooser's control. The staff thrust again. The immortal spear spun out of Arlensul's hand. It did not vanish. It fell at Svavar's feet.
Now you must decide.
38. Another View
Pinkus Ghort murmured, "Oh, shit," so gently and so emotionlessly that Else knew he was deeply frightened.
Principatй Divino Bruglioni said, "I agree wholeheartedly, Captain."
Else asked, "Your Grace, can you do anything to shelter the troops?" To right and left the covering force remained in place. The secondary reserve had come forward to witness a once-in-a-millennium event.
The soldiers were mostly Devedian toughs. But Else got little chance to give that any thought.
Ghort said, "Here we go."
Else grasped the hilt of his tired old sword.
The one Instrumentality split the shield of the other, then knocked its spear away. The night lance fell at the lesser soultaken's feet. Wisps of things began to leak from the dark mandala.
The soultaken rained blows on the remnant of the other's shield.
Whispers raced among the witnesses. To a man, they knew they were witnessing the end of a major myth cycle.
There were Pramans on the city wall, now. They were more spiritually distressed than their Episcopal and Devedian foes. Pramans were so fiercely attached to their faith that they could conceive of no other reality. Even granting diabolic status to the Instrumentalities of the Night was an impossible stretch for some.
The lesser Instrumentality fought strongly and valiantly, holding her own. Her opponent was handicapped by the limits of human flesh.
The lesser soultaken retrieved Arlensul's spear. I
More than misty ghosts began leaking through the dark mandala. Armed men shambled out, banging into one another in confusion. Were they blind? No. They had just awakened. And few were in prime condition.
Else knew enough of the myths of the north to understand what was happening. The Hall of Heroes, of me Great Sky Fortress, was spewing its harvest across distance and time. No accident, obviously, but definitely senseless. Why would a clutch of forgotten gods get involved in a squabble between unrelated religious enemies half a thousand miles from any where they ever held sway?
39. A Living Brother, a Loving Death
Svavar understood what had to be done. That was as plain as anything he ever knew. He and Grim would shake the Old Ones' control no other way. He gathered Arlensul's spear, forged by the Instrumentalities themselves. It felt remarkably light and agile in his hand.
It struck like an adder's tongue dart, entering Grim's back easily as a dagger into soft cheese. He felt his brother's heartbeat, relayed down the haunted shaft. He screamed as Grim's life flooded otherworldly metal and wood.
He screamed again when the rage and madness of the Gray Walker followed. The pain was beyond imagination. But it lasted only an instant. Then the One was away, sprinting for the dark mandala but missing it and continuing onward in a large, blind arc.
Dead men tripping over dead men continued to pour out of the mandala, driven by Arlensul's sisters. They spread out across the slope.
He had done Arlensul's will. He was supposed to fall on the spear himself, now, he supposed. But that was not going to happen. A fragment of the One had infected him through the Chooser's blade.
The adder's tongue flicked.
Arlensul was surprised. This did not fit her plan. Svavar was surprised himself as a part of the Chooser reached him through the spear.
He screamed some. The pain seemed to go on and on and on but in reality lasted only seconds. Then came a flood of emotion as the warrior Gedanke staggered out of the dark mandala, harried by Arlensul's sisters.
The foulest blow, Arlensul ceased to exist while straining toward her dead lover.
Not even the Instrumentalities of the Night are true immortals. And that, Svavar realized vaguely, was the cause of all his despair.
Stupid, enfeebled gods far from events had heard a snatch of an echo running through the canyons of time and, in their dread of marginalization and extinction, had latched onto that one remote moment as the key to their continued existence.
How could he know these things?
Arlensul’s spear leapt in his hands. Her sister Sprenghul shrieked in mortal agony. The Great Sky Fortress was bereft of another sustaining Instrumentality. Svavar felt power and knowledge flood him. That spear was something from darkest legend, a Harvester of Souls. Each Instrumentality it devoured made it easier for him to draw power and knowledge from the next.
Svavar smiled weakly. They had guessed wrong. All of them. Their Godslayer was right here among them, the tool chosen to destroy their expected assassin.
There was a mythic irony here. Or, perhaps, Instrumentalities of a higher plane were dabbling. The gods of the gods might be at play.
Svavar turned on the last of the Choosers, Fastthal, still driving Heroes into the world. Her father jogged past. The Heroes milled. Some drifted toward the soldiers Svavar sensed watching from cover not far away. Some meandered along the foot of the wall. Some climbed.
Fastthal shrieked in rage and fled into the dark mandala. Svavar had no trouble seeing through that, now. He saw the rest of the Old Ones, in all their dreaded forms. They were as confused as the Heroes, and frightened besides. They did not know what to do, now.
In the end they chose withdrawal. They closed the dark mandala, isolating themselves from their monstrous regiment of dead and mutilated killers. Svavar could not stop them, nor could he get through to punish them.
He noted that his brother, Grimur Grimmsson, had died as he had expected throughout his life, far from home and to little point, not even in real despair. He had lived as he believed he should. Strong and predatory.
The tale was told at last. Asgrimmur Grimmsson could lie down and abandon his burdens.
Svavar planted the butt of Arlensul's spear in the snow. This
should be almost painless.
He tried. He could not do it. Not because he was a coward, though. The spear refused to accept him. The power and knowledge he had absorbed from the Choosers and the All Father, before he got away, would not let him. Nor did the Asgrimmur Grimmsson core of him really want to do it There was work to be done, still. There were debts not yet paid.
Svavar was slow but he got there. Asgrimmur Grimmsson was dead. What stood in his boots now was an ascending Instrumentality. He could not slay himself even had he that will. Someone had to do that for him, now.
His universe filled with thunder and lightning, sulfurous stench and yet more incredible pain, first exploding in his left shoulder, then at a dozen points elsewhere in his body.
40. The Fire and the Pain
Ghort told Else, "Pipe, I'm ready to check on out. I have officially seen everything."
"What did you see?" Else did not trust his own eyes. Those things out there were among the greatest demons of the Night. Holy men in the Kaifate of al-Minphet would insist that they did not exist. They were folktales, nothing more. Like the fabrications of the professional storytellers of Lucidia.
The soultaken attacked his companions. While countless dead men tramped into the world and, after some confusion, shambled toward the living. Meaning some turned toward the city wall, more headed east to meet the approaching Imperial
probe, and most came at Else and his crusaders.
Not once had Else seen Gledius Stewpo among the Devedian-heavy reserve but he heard that dwarf bellow, "Stand to your matches! Now, fire!"
Two hundred firepowder weapons barked during a two-second span. The weapons had remained unseen until the dwarf summoned them forth.
The fu
sillade tore the approaching heroes apart. Else was aghast at how swiftly firepowder missiles flung the power of the Night into oblivion.
Few of the ferocious dead warriors got close enough to engage the Patriarchal troops. The Deves produced an endless rolling thunder. The smoke became oppressive.
Results were less sanguine where there were no firepowder weapons. The Imperials were not prepared to deal with fighters who were dead already. Their best defense was discipline.
Once they formed ranks they managed to fend off wild attackers fighting as individuals.
A tenth of the heroes chose to assault al-Khazen. Else saw no obvious reason why some scarecrow figures chose to clamber up the wall, but they did, easy as insects. When they reached the battlements they murdered everyone in sight.
The firepowder smoke cleared away. Streamers of dark mist came from al-Khazen as the sorcerers within engaged the undead warriors. That resistance attracted the interest of most of the dead still facing the Patriarchal troops.
Else pushed up off the cold, wet ground and eased forward. Ghort followed. He crowded in against Else. "What the hell happened here, Pipe? I sure as fuck don't want it to be what I'm pretty sure it was."
Behind them, the Devedian fusiliers prepared to withdraw. Al-Khazen's garrison would not mount a pursuit
Firepowder tubes continued to crack occasionally. Sharpshooters plinked the blind, howling thing jogging in its wide circle. That thing no longer looked anything like the man it had
It was aware of little outside itself. It passed near Else without sensing him. The inverse was not true.
The pain was worse than it had been with the bogon in the Ownvidian Knot, though more sudden and stimulated over a much shorter range. Else collapsed. But he was not alone. He would not have to explain to Pinkus Ghort. Ghort was down himself, clawing at his temples.
